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3.61 AVERAGE
3.61 AVERAGE
And Only to Deceive is the first book in the Lady Emily series. Emily is "newly" widowed (newly being her husband has been dead for a little over a year, yet she's still in mourning by society's standards). She wasn't married very long to her husband before his death and when he died she didn't feel a very strong emotional upheaval. But upon hearing varying stories about her husband through his many acquaintances she beings to become more interesteD in his life.
As Emily begins to learn more about her husband she discovers there was more about him than she was aware. She discovers that he was very much involved in the world of art. As she's going through his things she finds some notes warning her about delving too far into her husband's past warning of danger. Obviously instead of deterring Emily this just intrigues her ever more. She soon find herself caught up in a forgery ring for for works of art from the Greek period. So who can Emily trust amongst her late husband's closest friends? Everyone seems to have something to hide.
I think the fact of Emily sort of stubling on to the mystery was really written well. She didn't go looking for anything amiss, it just kind of presented itself to her and she followed the path that it led.
I liked Emily's character a lot. She's a woman in the victorian age who has this opportunity to be independent and she really takes it and grows. I like that we get to see the difference between society at the time and the emergence of women trying to become more equal. I liked that Alexander wrote many of the side characters as being understanding to Emily's feelings of wanting independence and not shunning her because of it. Obviously not everyone agrees that women can drink port after dinner with the men and smoke cigars, but it was interesting to see her dive in and be supported.
The mystery was really well written. There were a lot of twists and turns and I'll admit sometimes I really didn't know where the mystery was going. But I was interested the whole time in fiding out how everything played out. There were many times that I questioned who to trust convinced that everyone was somehow in on it.
The book definitely left me wanting to know what happens next for the characters. I can't wait to start reading [b:A Poisoned Season|512391|A Poisoned Season (Lady Emily, #2)|Tasha Alexander|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1348118614s/512391.jpg|1151103]. Until Then!
As Emily begins to learn more about her husband she discovers there was more about him than she was aware. She discovers that he was very much involved in the world of art. As she's going through his things she finds some notes warning her about delving too far into her husband's past warning of danger. Obviously instead of deterring Emily this just intrigues her ever more. She soon find herself caught up in a forgery ring for for works of art from the Greek period. So who can Emily trust amongst her late husband's closest friends? Everyone seems to have something to hide.
I think the fact of Emily sort of stubling on to the mystery was really written well. She didn't go looking for anything amiss, it just kind of presented itself to her and she followed the path that it led.
I liked Emily's character a lot. She's a woman in the victorian age who has this opportunity to be independent and she really takes it and grows. I like that we get to see the difference between society at the time and the emergence of women trying to become more equal. I liked that Alexander wrote many of the side characters as being understanding to Emily's feelings of wanting independence and not shunning her because of it. Obviously not everyone agrees that women can drink port after dinner with the men and smoke cigars, but it was interesting to see her dive in and be supported.
The mystery was really well written. There were a lot of twists and turns and I'll admit sometimes I really didn't know where the mystery was going. But I was interested the whole time in fiding out how everything played out. There were many times that I questioned who to trust convinced that everyone was somehow in on it.
The book definitely left me wanting to know what happens next for the characters. I can't wait to start reading [b:A Poisoned Season|512391|A Poisoned Season (Lady Emily, #2)|Tasha Alexander|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1348118614s/512391.jpg|1151103]. Until Then!
I'm surprised I finished this one. I was bored for the first 150 pages as it took FOREVER to get anything going plotwise and even the character development was thin. Definitely won't be reading the rest of the series!
3.5 the writing was good and there was some interesting historical info and the author researched classics (I like when authors do research) but detective novels aren't my genre
I thought that the book was highly thought out and researched very well. The story was intriguing and clearly organized. I think the problem that I had was that while reading it, I felt it was all of those things, which made those things seemed forced. It was fun, but it was the kind of fun in which you know you're supposed to be having fun, which actually decreases from the overall effectiveness. At the end of the day, I'm not sorry to have read it, but I wasn't moved.
To be perfectly honest, I found this book really irritating. The plotting of the mystery wasn't terrible (although you could see the ending a mile away) but the main character felt completely out of place in a historical setting. I would still have found her annoying in a modern one but at least it wouldn't have been so jarring. Of course, every man she meets falls completely in love with her at first sight.
The worst part though, is at the end it's revealed that her husband's diary had all the information she needed! Supposedly she had scholarly tendencies and was falling in love with this man but not enough to read a year's worth of diary entries? Gah!
The worst part though, is at the end it's revealed that her husband's diary had all the information she needed! Supposedly she had scholarly tendencies and was falling in love with this man but not enough to read a year's worth of diary entries? Gah!
This was so disappointing. I wanted to love this book--the time period! the focus on archaeology and antiquities at the time!-- but this ended up falling so flat. I'm all for strong women, but Emily was unbelievable for the time period, and it was hard to believe her transformation from flighty socialite to rebellious scholar. On top of it, she was dense. It's frustrating as a reader to have figured out who she should and shouldn't trust from the beginning, when Emily has so much trouble with it that it becomes the main suspense of the book.
adventurous
mysterious
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
This book started out interesting, with a heroine who is a little outside the norm, but loses steam rapidly from there. It is clear to the reader from a very early point who is the "bad guy" in the mystery and who is the "good guy who just happens to do occasionally suspicious things and who could clear this all up immediately if he would just be straightforward instead of being uselessly mysterious." Our heroine, however, is taken in for 90% of the book by the bad guy, and develops a deep suspicion about the good guy for no apparent reason other than to drive and prolong the thin plot. This, needless to say, is exceeding tiresome.
Aside from the mystery, the rest of the book is taken up with pedantic information about Victorian society and the myriad ways it limited women, all of which is obvious to any reader who has ever read any other novels set in or written in the Victorian period. The heroine's bold rejection of many of these Victorian conventions rings somewhat false, like wish-fulfillment for the author as opposed to natural and believable character development.
Aside from the mystery, the rest of the book is taken up with pedantic information about Victorian society and the myriad ways it limited women, all of which is obvious to any reader who has ever read any other novels set in or written in the Victorian period. The heroine's bold rejection of many of these Victorian conventions rings somewhat false, like wish-fulfillment for the author as opposed to natural and believable character development.
I liked this a lot. Emily, the heroine is very likeable. Her mother is perhaps too stereotypically awful, making Emily seem all the more pleasant. I liked how we got inside her head - her ambivalent feelings regarding her dead husband. I also liked the allusions to the Iliad, which I have yet to read. It seemed obvious to me who she would end up with, but that part also worked nevertheless. I will probably continue to read the series.
3.5-3.75 This was an interesting story with a mix of history, intrigue, light romance, and society. Lady Emily was an interesting character and the story is full of history that is obviously well researched. I loved the parts about the museum and art pieces with replicas. Went to a lovely author chat with Tasha Alexander and her husband author Andrew Grant, they were so fun and wonderful to listen to.